For a bit more professional look at the Samsung Omnia 2, we have this 10 minute review of this Windows Mobile smartphone. This is the GSM version on Bell Canada, but should share much software and features with the Verizon version, which is set for imminent release.
See his earlier unboxing video here.
Rupert Murdoch stopped by at an FTC workshop on the future of journalism to say that the federal government should “stay out” of regulating the journalism business. Except, in the same speech he said exactly the opposite. What he meant was that he didn’t want the government to get in the business of funding journalism. Yet, in the very same speech he did say that the government shouldn’t allow Google to link to his news stories, calling it “theft” yet again. Again, he didn’t explain why he hasn’t blocked Google if it’s actually “theft.” Not surprisingly, compounding these contradictions, he failed to mention (or perhaps recognize?) that the sites he owns do plenty of aggregating themselves. I’ve been told, however, that Arianna Huffington is making that point, though I wonder if Rupert stuck around to hear it. Update: Huffington has published her speech, which does a very nice job making the point.
Other points made by Murdoch include the bizarre claim that “advertising is dead” as a model to support journalism. You would think that someone who has lived through a bunch of ad market cycles wouldn’t extrapolate from just a short period, but that appears to be what Murdoch is doing. About the only other explanation for all of this is that he’s simply trying to confuse and throw off both the competition and the federal government — but at some point someone should directly call him on his various contradictions and confusion.
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Microsoft is having a Windows Phone event for Latin America in Buenos Aires. Yes, Windows Mobile 6.5 has come to Latin America.
11 Latin American countries will be receiving over the next few days the first phones with the new Microsoft operating system. The exact dates or countries have not been specified.
Douglas Smith, director of mobile division in the Americas at Microsoft, announced that the first three phones with Windows Phone we will have available are: Samsung Omnia II, HTC Touch 2 and LG GW550.
Source: emovilPRO
This post was submitted by teo.
Filed under: LA Auto Show, Podcasts, Audi, Buick, Chevrolet, Ford, GM, Mazda, Nissan
With the LA Auto Show near at hand, Chris, Dan, and Editor Extraordinaire Paukert sat down and talked over some of the latest for Episode #155 of the Autoblog Podcast. First up is the surprisingly thorough re-rework of the Mustang, before we move on to talk about the early release of U.S.-spec Ford Fiesta pictures. Gazing at photos brings us to the Chevrolet Cruze, which has also been lensed in North American garb. The Chinese-market Buick Excelle is rumored as a possibility for our market, and we scratch our heads about that for a while. Toyota’s handling of its gas pedal recall and Nissan’s low-priced and well-integrated navigation unit wraps it up before we move on to some of your questions. Right before signing off, we jump back to talk briefly about the newly unveiled Audi A8 and Saab’s sad fortunes. At one hour, 50 minutes, it’s an epic. We blame Paukert.
If you get bored once the new Autoblog Podcast bliss has worn off, check out our colleagues at Joystiq and Engadget. Let us know what you think by dropping us an email at Podcast at Autoblog dot com, reviewing the show in iTunes, filling out our survey, or even leaving us a voicemail on our Google Voice line 734-288-8POD (734-288-8763). Thanks for listening, we’ll see you next week!
Continue reading Autoblog Podcast #155 – ‘Twas the night before the LA Auto Show…
Autoblog Podcast #155 – ‘Twas the night before the LA Auto Show… originally appeared on Autoblog on Tue, 01 Dec 2009 13:31:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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China’s remarkably outspoken and investigative Caijing magazine recently suffered massive set backs with the departure of top writers and the majority of its staff.
Apparently there were some serious disputes between Caijing’s top talent and Caijing’s owner, the ‘Stock Exchange Executive Council’.
Meanwhile Caijing recently managed to put out a November 23rd issue using what remains of their staff, we’ve noticed that their English website is dead.
The headline story is dated November 13th.
While the Chinese version appears to be struggling on. Is it really that hard to find English translators?
One of this magazine’s past strengths was its ability to let intelligent Chinese writers explain what’s going on to the non-Chinese world. Even if the magazine is still published, the website was a far more useful tool given the frequency of its updates in the past.
In the latest issue, the new Caijing affirmed its past values, but the dead English website makes us wonder: is the old Caijing already dead?
WSJ: The latest issue of Caijing also features a statement of support from a former high-ranking establishment media official. “Caijing magazine faces a heavy task and a long road ahead,” wrote Zhong Peizhong, onetime head of the news division of the Communist Party’s Central Propaganda Department. “I wholeheartedly wish Caijing magazine even greater success in the future.”
International Business Times: It said that the mass resignation is followed escalating pressure in recent months by the Stock Exchange Executive Council (SEEC), to rid the outspoken magazine of its widely reputable editorial independence. “The key is, the SEEC wants to intervene and censor all of our financial stories, particularly cover stories and investigative reports. That’s unbearable (for us),” one source said.
“None of the real stories we used to run would have been OK (with the SEEC) if they stepped in,” the source said. SEEC is Caijing’s owner, the unique shareholder, which always to intervene and censor the most important articles since July .
We hope nothing changes. But if it does change, then luckily Caijing’s old departed team is reportedly organizing a new venture called Caixin. Love it.
Chinais.com: Caijing insiders gave the information that the resignation was planned even earlier this year around August. The China Times found an interesting domain name “CAIXINNEWS.COM” (财新新闻) which is registered by Weiping Kang (康伟平), an editor of Caijing Magazine on the 6th of August. this domain registration unveils the possible date when either party started to set up their tactic – a strategic move from Hu Shuli or just one defensive registration of Caijing Magazine.
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November was not a great month for Apple, at least according to web metrics firm Net Applications. While one could argue the launch of Windows 7 in October may have negatively impacted market share for OS X, Safari also lost ground to Chrome, and even the iPhone OS saw a slight decline against competitors.
For OS X, the decline could actually be good news. In the first full month since the release of Windows 7, OS X declined to 5.12 percent of the overall market, down from 5.27 percent last month. That’s not so bad. However, if Windows 7 is to blame for that modest decline, it’s a little difficult to understand how Linux saw an increase of 0.04 percent, to an even one-hundredth of overall market share. More positively, Snow Leopard continues to account for an increasing share of the OS X user base.
From September through November, OS X 10.6 represented 18 percent, 22 percent and 27 percent, respectively, of the OS X user base. Those are impressive gains after launching on Aug. 28. In contrast, Windows 7 launched on Oct. 22, and nearly six weeks later is just reaching 5 percent of Windows market share. Faster uptake of OS X means new technologies see more widespread support sooner; slower for Windows 7 means more support headaches for Microsoft.
Similarly, Safari 4 has become the standard among Mac versions of the web browser, accounting for more than 80 percent of Safari users since launching in June. In terms of overall market share, Safari, including the Windows version, represents 4.36 percent, down slightly from 4.4 percent in October. Still, that percentage is moving slowly upward over time, though not nearly as fast as Google’s Chrome. Chrome is now at 3.93 percent, up from 3.57 percent for the previous month, and will almost assuredly pass Safari on the desktop within three months. Of course, some solace can be had in that Chrome and Safari both use WebKit. More WebKit users, and Gecko users with Firefox, ultimately mean a greater adherence to neutral standards for web browsers.
As for the iPhone, November was one of those rare months that saw the iPhone OS lose ground. In terms of overall market share among operating systems, iPhone OS may be insignificant, but the actual number of users probably exceeds 60 million. Nonetheless, market share for iPhone OS was 0.43 percent in November, down from 0.44 in October. Competing mobile operating systems like JavaME, Symbian, Andriod and RIM, all saw increases of 0.01 or 0.02 percent, minuscule changes, but still increasing.
It should be noted, though, that Net Applications data this month comes with a “preliminary” warning label. That could mean there are still slight variations to be found. For a month that showed a little decline for Apple, it might turn out to be more of a plateau.
Biggest question I have is how is the speed of the processor. Especially when browsing the web with IE and Opera. How does it compare to the current 528mhz chips.
Web browsing is brilliant, processor is blazing fast. It does everything I’ve thrown at it so far, and I’ve stopped caring that there isn’t a task manager in the top of the home screen. Opera now loads faster enough that there really is no need for IE, though IE does do flash (albeit badly) – I’ve yet to try flash in Opera.
as much details as possible about the USB host please.
So far, I’ve got nothing on that.
I’m hesitating between a Touch Pro 2 and a HD2. I want to go for the HD2 but before I want to be sure about 2 topics not really developed on other reviews: The screen keyboard, is it good? practical? Can it replace a hardware keyboard? Is it fast?
And I’d like to know the quality of the Mic / Speaker. Touch Pro 2 had great review about this and his hand free capabilities. Is the HD2 as good?
Thank you,
Gaz
How it feels without stylus, on gui element that not yet skinned by touchflo.
Some of them can be a litte awkward, but in reality there not too bad. Using the pinch zoom feature does make things better though.
I’d like to know how the capacitive screen is to use on those ugly-old standard WM applications (Pressing the ‘X’ button, using scroll-bars, etc.
The scroll bars expand when you touch them which makes scrolling through long lists really easy.
Ditto on battery life – how long does it last with continuous web-browsing, video/audio playback, etc.
Playing a WVGA film full screen on headphones at 50% brightness lasted a lot longer than the 2h30 film I was watching, at which point I fell asleep. That was with push email in the background over HSDPA… Probably not the best battery test, and I’ll try and do a proper one at a later date.
How much free RAM is there after bootup with no programs running?
The simple answer is “enough”. With Sense, you do lose around 50MB, but even so there’s more than 200MB free (and that’s with no optimisations at all).
And finally, is it possible to zoom using one hand only?
Some applications like Opera do zoom on a double tap. The pinch zooming is pretty hard with one hand as it’s a massive screen.
Hello, would like to know how Sense is compatible with "old" applications such as agenda fusion, applications which really close the program instead of putting them backwards (i use wktask, but can be others) or pocketbreeze (who show on today page next appointements tasks etc). Those old apps may be too old, but are must have for me to use WinMo efficiently, and could prevent me from buying this beautiful HD2. And, btw, is it possible to put shortcuts on the today page of Sense to most common apps or functions (all the above, shortcut for silent & vibrate, etc…) Thanks for the answer, and excuse my bad english.
Sense itself is pretty much just a today plugin. Its not incompatible as such, but for other today screen plugins, its Sense or something else, not both. You can disable Sense though, and the whole thing somehow seems even faster! You can put shortcuts to whatever you want, though silent and vibrate may need applets to work on the sense main page.
Thanks a lot for your answer. Sounds logical. But still wondering how it works in "real life". how about switching between 2 or 3 opened apps, view calls list during a call, how pocketbreeze could show all appointement on the start page/home screen if there is no more start page (but the sense page), if it is possible to put more than 9 shortcuts (9 blocks only are available, 3 of them always displayed), …. the whole impression i have is that the sense skin is not very upgradable, despite it’s beautiful. And i love to tweak and put shortcut everywhere on my WinMo 5. But maybe this is not the right place here for such questions, and once again, thanks a lot for the answer.
Switching between 2/3 open apps is as simple as either reopening them, or finding them in task manager. If you didn’t shut them, you can just minimise the front app and the one behind it will pop up again. Viewing call history in a call is Menu->Call history, and then you can filter it if you want. PocketBreeze wouldn’t be able to work with Sense for that. There are only 9 items by default, but I guess XDA-Devs will figure out a way to add more. With Sense, you can put shortcuts on the first page, and the WM6.5 start menu lets you move shortcuts around. You can also just disable Sense, and you’re back to stock WM6.5 which has the same today screen setup as WM5 for things like PocketBreeze.
How well you can see whats on screen when outside ? I have TyTN and I can’t see anything on screen outside.
Depends on what the weather is like. In too bright sunlight, there’s no chance, and not even the Omnias with the AMOLED screens are visible. Generally though, it’s perfectly usable. A good deal brighter than my Diamond or Prophet.
I’d be interested to know the quality of the external speaker in comparison to the diaomond. My diamond’s is shockingly poor and i rarely here my phone ringing anywhere even slightly noisy.
To my mind, it’s rather good. Plays music loudly, and I’ve yet to miss a call. And it’s got “Pocket Mode” that makes it ring louder if the proximity sensor is covered i.e. in a bag or pocket.
Norway, Europe | Subterranean Sites
Your grandma is right. The bananas that you can buy today in your local supermarket are not as sweet as the ones that she ate in her childhood.
There are many types or “cultivars” of any given fruit, a cultivar is a cultivated plant which is chosen and given a special name because of its desired characteristics, and various types of cultivars (for example in apples, the Red Delicious in the 1870s) come in and out of favor over the years. In the middle of 20th century the dominant banana cultivar exported to North America and Europe was the Gros Michel. Sometime around 1950, it become virtually extinct due to the rapid spread of the so called “Panama Disease,” a fungal infection that attacks the roots of the banana plant. The Gros Michel was replaced with more resiliant but less tasty Cavendish cultivar.
Modern agriculture is generally focused on maximizing profit by extracting maximal possible yield of crop. A small number of specially selected cultivars of any given crop are planted throughout the world, displacing in the process numerous other local varieties. This approach guarantees consistently high yields under the normal conditions but harbors a hidden danger.
Essentially, every single comertialy grown plant is a clone of one of only a few specially selected strains of genetic material. Diversity of genetic material is thus reduced to a bare minimum, leaving crop species exposed to any disease which can exploit that single strain. With corn, wheat and rice, being grown world wide in such a fashion, this is concern that one newly mutated strain of fungus could whip out an entire world crop in matter of months, causing massive food shortages.
In order to preserve the gene diversity of major food crops, international institutions have established a series of green gene banks, which store samples of genetic material of various strains of each plant species.
Svalbard Seed Bank is meant as a sort of safety net, a reserve of last resort and the vault functions like a safety deposit box in a bank. It stores duplicate specimens from genebanks worldwide and while the Svalbard seed bank owns the building, the individual depositor owns the contents of his or her box and the access to individual specimens is regulated by their respective depositors. The facility has a capacity to conserve 4.5 million seed samples. With approximately 1.5 million distinct seed samples of agricultural crops thought to exist, the Svalbard Seed Bank can store roughly three of each sample. Under the current temperature conditions in the vault (temperatures similar to those in a kitchen freezer) the seed samples can remain usable to begin new crops for anywhere from 2000 to 20,000 years.
The seed bank is located in an old copper mine on remote northern island of Spitsbergen, Norway. The main storage is 120m inside a sandstone mountain, on a tectonically dead island. The bank employs a number of robust security systems. Seeds are packaged in special four-ply packets and heat sealed to exclude moisture. A local coal mine and powerplant supplies the electricity for refrigeration control. The remote northern location also serves as a natural fridge. In the case of complete power failure at least several weeks will elapse before the temperature rises to the −3 °C of the surrounding sandstone bedrock.
The Svalbard Global Seed Vault opened for deposits officially on February 26, 2008 with the construction of the vault financed entirely by Norwegian Government. The operational cost is currently shared by Norway and the Global Crop Diversity Trust.
The market is rallying, but so what. SocGen’s uber-bearish analyst Albert Edwards says you should be terrified if you’re a bull, and that if you’re not terrified, you’re probably deluding yourself.
FT: Alphaville has his latest report:
We have just had the worst decade’s performance for equity investors on record. Relative to government bonds, equities have been an even bigger disaster. Surely after such a terrible decade for equity investors things can only get better?
On a ten year view, equities may indeed prove to be a good investment. On a 1-2 year view, however, we still see much pain to come. After what we have been though so far, where the bulls’ optimism has been crushed in 2001/2 and in 2007/8 surely there must be a heavy weight of self-doubt yoked onto the shoulders of the bulls – but apparently not!
The lesson from Japan is that while de-leveraging plays itself out, the global economy will remain extremely vulnerable. The Great Moderation is dead. It was built on a super-cycle of private sector debt. We know from Japan, we now return to what was before, i.e. highly volatile and unpredictable cycles. Recession will quickly follow recovery.
And he concludes with this terrifying slide:
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Many economists draw comparisons between the United States now and Japan in 1990.
For those who aren’t familiar with Japan’s recent economic history, this is not a good thing.
Japan’s stock market peaked in 1989 at about 40,000. It now trades around a quarter of that level, or 10,000. GDP, meanwhile, has barely grown at all.
Economists used to refer to Japan’s malaise as “a lost decade.” Now they’re saying “lost decades.”
Our guest Howard Davidowitz sees a similarly horrific future in store for the U.S. He calls America’s current path, rich in deficit spending and weak in currency a “road to nowhere.”
He also doesn’t buy the arguments of those who reassure us that Japan’s problems are “cultural” and “demographic”–and, therefore, that it’s different here. Japan’s problems are the same as our problems (artificially low interest rates and a bailout culture), Davidowitz says. The only difference is that we’re about 20 years earlier into the collapse.
If we are Japan, what is the outlook for the stock market (and your retirement savings)? Not good.
If the DOW behaves the way Japan’s NIKKEI has, the DOW will trade at about 4,000 in 2025.
See Also: The United States Of Wusses
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The numbers are trickling in. Here’s how U.S. automakers did or are expected to do this November:
It’s almost as if… consumers are buying cars again.
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Filed under: Truck, Europe, Volkswagen, South America
Well looky here – it’s the latest in a long line of oddly named trucks from Volkswagen. This time, the Amarok refers to a cryptozoological Inuit giant wolf-creature that eats those who dares to hunt alone. No really. Regardless, the Amarok is VW’s first pickup truck since the Caddy, aka the Rabbitamino first released in 1980. Aside from being thirty-years more new, the Amarok looks to be a bit, well, more stout.
Spartan, too – especially the no frills interior. And here’s the really good part for you truck dudes – it’s a real-deal, honest-to-goodness body-on-frame worker bee. Meaning it can haul 2,300 pounds and tow nearly three tons (5,600 pounds) when equipped with VW’s 2.0-liter common-rail turbo diesel four-cylinder that’s good for 163 hp and 295 lb-ft of torque.
A smaller diesel motor with 122 hp and 250 torques will be an option, as well as a direct-injected gasoline engine. True, it’s not a Ford F-450 Super Duty. But then again, what is? And really, if hauling a couple of jet skis or a track car are your thing (as opposed to say a yacht), the Amarok could be your truck. If you live in Europe, South America, Asia, Africa or Australia. Predictably we can’t get the Argentinian-built Amarok here. But feel free to inflame your trucky jealousy by reading the full press release, after the jump. Hat tips to Carlos and Doug!
Gallery: Volkswagen Amarok
[Source: Pickuptrucks.com via Argentina Auto Blog]
Continue reading Officially Official: Volkswagen Amarok pickup makes the scene
Officially Official: Volkswagen Amarok pickup makes the scene originally appeared on Autoblog on Tue, 01 Dec 2009 13:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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There was a time when you could go to any schoolyard and see kids being kids. Kids would run, leap, throw, and exert themselves with the pure joy of uncorrupted youth. They were suddenly realizing their bodies were incredible machines capable of precise, complex movements, and the games they played developed these capabilities. Dirt clod fights, epic dodgeball matches, and tetherball developed hand-eye coordination and agility; roughhousing that never graduated into enmity taught kids the value of a few bumps and bruises (as well as how to dish ‘em out); games like tag, capture the flag, and monkey in the middle emphasized foot speed, lateral agility, and rapid changes of direction. The teacher on yard duty might hand out a citation or break up a little scuffle once in awhile, but recess was generally pretty relaxed. About the only thing your average schoolyard athlete worried about was explaining away the grass stains, or maybe the scuffed knees. Looking back, we really had it good: unstructured play, impromptu workouts that didn’t feel like work but got us into great shape and developed our social skills. We were little Groks, cultivating our minds and bodies without actively planning a routine (or play date). It probably helped that we didn’t have Nintendo DS Lites or smart phones (or overbearing parents) to distract us, but the fact remains that we just were. A bit like Grok, we didn’t run and jump to get better at running and jumping; we ran and jumped because it was fun, because it simply felt like the right thing to do. Our athletic development was merely a bonus.
We’ve totally lost that. Kids now spend recess checking their Facebook statuses, their weekly itineraries, and catching up on piles of homework. I actually have a close friend in school administration – principal of a public elementary school – who laments what she sees as the loss of recess. Well, recess is technically still around, but it’s been neutered into some unrecognizable form. Dodgeball is widely banned (promotes competition and inequality), and the random roughhousing and general tomfoolery kids used to get into are completely cracked down on. Dirt fights and wrestling, I can understand, but dodgeball? I weep. I weep, but I’m not even that surprised. Those red rubber balls sure do sting (the ego?), and we wouldn’t want our precious kids made aware of any discrepancies in ability between their peers and themselves. Save that revelation for adulthood – that’ll be healthy!
But the latest schoolyard casualty is too much to handle. I won’t stand for it. As of 2006, administrators in Cheyenne, Boston, and Spokane elementary schools have banned tag. Tag. It’s perhaps the oldest game in the world, and it’s being banned from schoolyards across the country – even here in my backyard, Santa Monica. They cite “concussions, broken bones and numerous bumps and scrapes” as potential causes for concern, as well as the “self-esteem issue.” I dunno about you, but I foresee far greater self-esteem issues for the kids who never learn the value of honest competition. Getting picked last is part of life. Losing is an essential skill. If they don’t learn these lessons early on in a natural, organic manner, how are kids supposed to handle the rigors and responsibilities of adult life, where the consequences are graver and your parents can’t come pick you up at lunch and get you ice cream?
I’m beginning to digress.
My point is this: those childhood games teach us important lessons, and they facilitate our athletic development. As adults, we stand to gain a lot from going back to these games, even if we were lucky enough to grow up in an age where kids were allowed to be kids (strike “allowed,” actually; kids simply were kids). Games like dodgeball, monkey in the middle, and especially tag are excellent ways to get a great, fun workout (I would advise against dirt clod fights and roughhousing with random adults – these tend to morph into actual fights). Play, after all, is one of the Primal Laws, and what better way to show your children the value of a good game of tag than by playing it with them?
Let’s remove the “childhood” tag from tag, shall we?
I focus on tag because it can be played anywhere without equipment. Dodgeball is great, but a good game requires a special ball, a court, and a certain amount of players. All you need for tag is a few participants and an open space. Tag’s also perhaps the purest, oldest game. I’m strictly guessing here, but I’d imagine organisms – hominids, dogs, otters, baboons, and squirrels – have been chasing each other around for no particular reason for millions of years. Go to a zoo or a dog park or a playground (sometimes) and you’ll see evidence of animals left to their own devices who default to chasing each other.
Tag is completely free form. There are no boundaries and few rules. In football, there are clear goals. A guy’s chasing you, but he knows exactly where you’re headed: to the endzone. In tag, you can be completely unpredictable. You’re darting this way and that way without a real spatial goal in sight – except to get the heck out of the other guy’s clutches. You’ll develop moves you never knew you had and agility you thought was long gone, all because you remove those conscious mental filters that slow things down and prevent pure instinctual reactions.
Tag is sprinting made effortless. Well, effort is still there, but you won’t be aware of it in a good game of tag; you’ll be too busy trying to stay “alive.” If you can’t seem to get out for a regular sprint session, you might try getting a gang together for tag. You’ll end up running what amounts to dozens of sprints without even thinking about it.
Tag promotes full-on effort. Even if you’re a committed sprinter, it can be tough to really hit maximum effort each time, because at the end of the day you’re alone on a track, or a stretch of grass. Unless you’ve got a competitive training partner, you’re in an official competition, or there’s a mountain lion on your tail, you’re missing that sense of urgency that compels the true sprint. When you get in the zone in a game of tag, you do everything you can to avoid being “it.” You dodge, roll, fake, and sprint as fast as humanly possible to avoid being tagged. If you really get into it, it’ll be as if there’s a lion on your heels or a world record to be broken – your body won’t know the difference, and your performance will improve.
There are dozens of varieties of tag. Most will work for your purposes just fine. British bulldogs, for example, begins with two “bulldogs” standing in the middle of the play area. Everyone else lines up on one end and tries to rush past the bulldogs to the other side. Those who are caught become bulldogs. The last one standing is the victor. Then there’s the always classic freeze tag, or even the modified tag variant hide and seek. Too many to name, but I think we can do better with our own variant.
I suppose the real “Grok Tag” would look something like basic schoolyard tag: one person trying to tag another person, who then becomes “it.” Just basics, no tricks or gimmicks. That’s fine, but I’m thinking we can distinguish ourselves and make it a real workout by throwing in a little twist.
You can modify Grok Tag to suit your needs and abilities. Raise or lower the reps as needed. Wear weighted vests for the duration. Have kettlebell stations positioned around the field of play, and substitute kettlebell swings into the game. You could even have a barbell sitting on the field – get tagged, do five deadlifts. The possibilities are endless, but the basic concept of being “punished” for getting tagged is key. You won’t want to do those twenty burpees or thirty squats, so you’re going to run like your life depends on it. Even the guys or girls who never get tagged still get a great sprint workout, and the guys or girls who always get tagged will only get stronger and faster.
I’ll admit. This can be a pretty hardcore workout and a far cry from the tag of your childhood, but its scalability means it will never be too hardcore for anyone. Plus, it’s a good way to ambush a reluctant workout partner: “Hey, wanna play a friendly game of tag?”And if your kids have never played the game, this might be a good way to introduce them to an archaic tradition while teaching them proper burpee and squat form.
Just don’t expect to see it in P.E. classes anytime soon.
Have your own thoughts on a variation of Primal tag? Share it in the comment board. Thanks, everyone!
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Saxony, Germany | Watery Wonders
Apparently, the Lichtenhain Waterfall just wasn’t good enough. A small waterfall in Kirnitzschtal in South Saxony, the original waterfall was improved in the 1830s by adding a “weir,” a small overflow dam used to raise the level of a stream, and in this case improve upon the looks and profitability of the waterfall.
Operated by a “water-puller” the “weir” or gate, they installed gave the operators another advantage: they can show off. While the Lichtenhain Waterfall was normally low flow, when enough tourists gathered, and paid the operator of course, the “waterfall-puller” pulls the gate and the water reservoir is emptied all at once. The normally calm waterfall became a rushing torrent to the delight of all around. Today, it is much the same, though you no longer have to pay the operator, the gate is pulled every half hour, and is timed to be in time with accompanying music.
The improvements weren’t entirely cosmetic, as the falls were also later used to power the Bad Schandau, a steel frame 171 foot tall (52.26 m) Art Nouveau elevator built in 1904.
The Lichtenhain Waterfall can be best reached by the Kirnitzsch valley tram, a narrow gauge old electric tramway, in operation since 1898 and now powered in part (roughly 20%) by solar panels, from Bad Schandau. Once dropped off, it is still roughly a half hours walk to the waterfall, which includes a very neat walk up “Jacob’s Ladder,” metal stairs through a narrow rift in Ritterschlucht gorge. Keep your eyes out for “cowshed” cave a huge rock arch, some 11 meters high.
Well, here we go again. For years we’ve questioned the wisdom of using real world laws to deal with issues within virtual worlds. You begin to open up quite the Pandora’s Box of problems. If it’s okay to charge someone for theft of virtual goods in a virtual world, what do you do if “theft” is a part of the game? And then does killing another character in a virtual world become “murder”? These issues are coming up again as Slashdot points out that a guy in the UK has been arrested for “robbery” of a player in the online world RuneScape. In this case, the arrested guy used a phishing scheme to get access to the username and password, making it similar to a story from two years ago involving “stolen goods” in Habbo Hotel that involved a similar “hacking” of an account.
But, again, it seems questionable to call this a robbery. Why not just charge the guy with violation of whatever laws there are against phishing or fraud, rather than robbery. These sorts of “robberies” can and probably should be dealt with directly in the virtual worlds themselves, where game administrators should be able to just “make things whole.” Instead of calling it a robbery, why not focus on the actual crime of phishing, rather than the questionable “crime” of “robbery” of another’s character.
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When Dubai wobbled last week, everyone rushed to the Internet to await confirmation of the imminent bailout.
And they saw what they wanted to see!
The airwaves (and pipes) were clogged by a steady stream of pundits declaring that there was no way Abu Dhabi would let Dubai go bust.
Why not?
Because if Dubai went bust, then… well… then the stock market might go down for a while! Then the idiots who loaned Dubai World money to build huge islands and buildings in the desert would have to pay for their stupidity! Then the buildings’ ownership would change in a debt restructuring–the kind that happens every day in a normally functioning capitalist economy!
INCONCEIVABLE!!!
Remarkably, against this tidal wave of panic and entitlement, Abu Dhabi stood its ground, refusing to reward idiocy by throwing more good money after bad.
In the United States, meanwhile, Messrs. Bernanke and Geithner no longer have to assure us that they will never let a big bank fail–because we understand that this guarantee has basically been written into the United States constitution. The LESSON OF LEHMAN BROTHERS has been learned, and the lesson is this:
We have become a nation of mamma’s boys.
Specifically, after 25 years of debt-fueled consumerism, we have become accustomed to instant gratification and instant fixes, led by politicians and regulators terrified of having to tell us the harsh truth:
We lost our discipline. Getting it back will make life tougher for a while. But it will make us stronger in the end.
It wasn’t always this way. In fact, the era of prosperity that we’ve just enjoyed was made possible by a leader with a huge spine–one who, unlike our current financial and economic leaders, wasn’t afraid to risk his job (and enormous public pressure and disapproval) to do the right thing.
Who was that leader?
Paul Volcker.
How much public hatred was Volcker willing to withstand to get us back on the right track?
Take a look at the chart below. The red bars are the Fed Funds rate (which Volcker directly controlled). The blue line is unemployment (which he indirectly controlled).
In 1980, with the country beset by chronic, runaway inflation, Paul Volcker decided to do something about it. Specifically, he hiked rates sharply, into a weak economy.
What happened?
He killed the economy.
Unemployment soared–spiking from 6% to well over 10%, the highest level since the Great Depression. The economy crashed back down into a double-dip recession. Millions of Americans were put out of work. The stock market plunged to 15 year lows.
But Paul Volcker held fast. And a few years later, inflation was all but dead, setting us up for two decades of prosperity (and one of letting ourselves go to pot).
Fast forward to today. Today, we are led by men like Ben Bernanke and Tim Geithner. Men who are so afraid of the consequences of making people pay for their profligacy and stupidity that they have restarted the debt bubble (free money and bailouts for Wall Street, FHA, cash for clunkers) and made Too Big To Fail a national policy.
Take another look at that chart.
We don’t either.
But at some level, we can’t say we blame them. Given our current national attitude, we would fire them instantly for even daring to suggest such a thing.
But we’d still be better off hearing it. And it would make us stronger and better in the end.
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If you’re looking for a solution that keeps track of various social networks at once, all in one centralized location, EventBox for the Mac was a nice beta program that did the trick. EventBox is no more, but the program still exists. It’s changed names and become Socialite (much more appropriate if you ask me), and come out of beta, too.
I downloaded the demo of the 1.0 release and ran it through its paces. The demo lets you have all the functionality of the full version, but you’re limited to running three different services or accounts. Which, honestly, isn’t much of a limitation for many users, myself included.
Socialite covers all the major bases, including Facebook, Twitter and Flickr. That would be enough for me, but it also will log you into Digg and Google Reader, or let you track RSS feeds yourself manually. For many people I know, opening Socialite first thing in the morning would clear their to-do list for the day.
Facebook integration lets you access status updates and photo albums, both yours and those of your friends. You can upload photos and update your status, but inbox access is still not a part of the deal, until Facebook opens that up to the API. Twitter gives you access to your timeline, mentions, and direct messages, and allows you to view your lists and lists you subscribe to. You can’t create new lists or modify them in this version of Socialite. Flickr includes contacts photos, but also Interestingness, which is one of my favorite parts of Flickr, so I’m glad it’s included.
None of these services share the same UI in their native formats. That’s why Socialite’s interface is so impressive. It manages to make the process of working with multiple services in the same shell incredibly intuitive and relatively painless. Well-designed icons, and consistent function placement across the board help make this happen.
Best of all, if you’d rather just deal with things as one big mess, you can work with updates from all your services at once in the macro view “Unread” menu, and all of the appropriate actions for each separate service still appears in the options section for each. And clicking on any update automatically brings up the quick input field related to that service.
Socialite is a great program, and well designed, but it can’t take the place of Tweetie on my Mac. The problem is that since starting to use Twitter, I’ve become less and less dependent on other social networks I belong to. Facebook I can check twice a day really, if I feel like it, and Flickr is something I never really used to begin with. No matter how well Socialite does Twitter, Tweetie still does it better, and with a much smaller memory footprint.
Still, if you like to frequent many social sites, and especially if you’re a Google Reader user, Socialite could be the perfect program to help keep things organized and nicely aggregated in one convenient location.
Manhattan, KS: Kansas Campus Compact today announced that students at seven of its thirteen member institutions would be coordinating service activities on Kansas Day 2010. These activities are part of the inaugural Kansas Campus Compact’s “Commemorate Kansas/Serve Kansas” program.
The program was created to promote higher education participation in activities that foster a greater appreciation for Kansas history and promote opportunities for students, faculty, and community members to do measurable, meaningful, sustainable service to their communities in support of the Kansas State Historical Society’s commemoration of the 149th Kansas Day on January 29, 2010. The seven institutions received mini-grant funding from Kansas Campus Compact (KsCC) to support their efforts.
“These creative projects are an indication that students and faculty at Kansas colleges and universities are aware of the importance of connecting their education with a civic purpose that serves all of Kansas’ citizens. We hope that these efforts serve as a model for other institutions across the state,” said Matthew Lindsey, Executive Director for KsCC.
The schools participating in the Commemorate Kansas/Serve Kansas program are Butler Community College, Fort Hays State University, Garden City Community College, Hutchinson Community College, Kansas State University, Seward County Community College, and Southwestern College. Students will be helping elementary students record interviews with their elders, designing Kansas history activities for elementary and middle school students and afterschool programming for the Boys and Girls Club, coordinating Kansas history after-school programming for the Boys and Girls Club in Hutchinson, recording oral histories of community members who played significant roles in the state’s human rights history, delivering educational presentations on the history of sustainability in Kansas to middle and high school students, and providing volunteer support for activities at the Kansas State Historical Museum. Site details can be found at http://www.k-state.edu/kscc/programs/kansas_day/projects.html.
Headquartered in Manhattan, KS, Kansas Campus Compact is a coalition of higher education committed to strengthening the collective commitment and capacity of leaders at colleges and universities to integrate civic engagement and responsibility into the higher educational curriculum and environment. For questions, contact Matthew Lindsey at (785) 320-0700.
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